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Monthly Archives: March 2018

The nineteenth edition of ‘Frames’ concluded last week in Mumbai. While I could not attend it this time, with all that we read in the press , it seems like always to have been organised well, attended well with a generous presence of the industry, the government as well as the partner countries. ‘Frames’ and ‘FICCI’ have had a special relationship with Entertainment & Media industry in India, and have been significant in bringing to the fore to the world as well as India, the business potential of its greatest expert ‘Bollywood’. It enters its 20th year soon and to me who has been involved with it for some length of time , its good to discuss its importance to the ‘Entertainment & Media Industry’ in the past , its relevance in the present and do a little dip stick for the future.

The Start

Early Nineties saw India opening its doors to the world for doing business. By initiating one of the most significant reform process, India opened the door for foreign investment to a large number of sectors barring a few, resulting in a large interest by the International community looking for growth as well as new markets. The more organised business sectors like Manufacturing as well as Services led by IT were the first to take advantage of this liberalization. Sectors like Entertainment & Media which at that time largely consisted of Print and Films and to some extent music could not take advantage due to restrictions on ownership as well as being an unstructured industry with very little information. Advent of ‘Satellite TV’ in the mid-nineties, which now is around 50% of the industry prompted the change in regulation to garner new investment in uncharted but very promising new territory. FICCI as India’s premier trade body through its Director ‘Amit Mitra’ (now the Finance Minister of West Bengal) and the E&M committee having as its chairman Mr Yash Chopra, Mr Amit Khanna and other E&M Stalwarts realized that in order to attract investment India needed to showcase its market potential, talent as well as potential partners to the investment world as well as E&M world leaders. ‘FRAMES’ was born out of this thought process and need.

Journey Thereafter:

‘FRAMES’ eversince instituted and even today remains one of the best events for the Entertainment & Media Industry in India. It has consistently reinforced its founding objectives which primarily was to be a forum/ platform for :

Showcasing the Indian E&M industry potential to the world.

Showcase Indian talent and services

Showcase new innovations in the industry.

Promoting partnership between Indian companies and companies in developed E&M markets.

Industry information of its different variants as well as their growth potential through FICCI FRAMES annual report.

Each of the key E&M companies both Indian as well as International have been a part of ‘FRAMES’ and almost all of the service providers/consultants have helped develop the information that FICCI FRAMES helped create as a benchmark for the industry and its constituents. Each of its event editions (including regional) over the past 19 years have had top government involvement, excellent discussion formats with world experts and have helped discussions on many of the partnerships which developed over this period. It has also provided the industry constituents the platform to have a constant dialogue with the government on the changes which this industry faces everyday. It was always a priviledge to have one’s name in their annual report and to be part of their inaugural session as well as their other sessions.

Despite all changes the difficulties it has persevered and one needs to congratulate the continuing FICCI team behind this endeavour.

The Future:

The Entertainment & Media industry worldover is in the throes of a major change. All accepted business models are under threat and the very existence for some of them is under question. Therefore a concept like’ FRAMES’ still hugely important but its objectives need to change with the times. Closer linkage of technology with entertainment becomes paramount when your distribution is likely to be technology led and Artificial Intelligence (AI) is likely to be playing a significant role in the future. ‘FRAMES’ need to evolve to the following.

being a premier platform for showcasing new trends & technology in Entertainment & Media Industry.

being a key interlocutor between the Industry and the Government of the day.

focus to being a platform to represent change in business models in addition to have focus of saying where growth is going to come.

Evolution of ‘FRAMES’ in many ways is happening and is an ongoing process. However it does need to step up to claim the mantle of the ‘Interlocutor’ as that is something the present E&M industry setup is missing. As it matures, this role will acquire major significance.

Let the new ‘FRAMES’ unveil the new partnership as the Entertainment & Media Industry walks into a ‘new’ chapter of its evolution.